PRESIDENT Yeltsin, recovering from pneumonia, spent most of on paperwork but managed a stroll outdoors while his opponents in parliament prepared to debate a document intended to force him from office.
Dr Sergei Mironov said Mr Yeltsin was in a "completely satisfactory condition" on his first day out of hospital at his country residence outside Moscow. He had worked for more than seven hours on papers and had gone for his first walk since developing pneumonia.
"He had work-related calls with his aides. Today he had a very fruitful loaded work day," Dr Mironov said.
But Mr Yeltsin's opponents are determined to take advantage of his absence and officials from the Duma said parliament would debate a draft document today which aims to oust Mr Yeltsin on health grounds.
Both the Kremlin and Duma legal experts have questioned parliament's right to attempt to do this, while the Duma's legal committee said a parliamentary declaration was an insufficient basis for impeachment proceedings.
But approval of the document or a prolonged absence from the corridors of power by Mr Yeltsin could prompt a fresh bout of political infighting in Russia.
As a first leg of this tussle, the opposition-dominated Duma agreed on Monday to debate a new request to the president to investigate his chief aide, Mr Anatoly Chubais, in connection with allegations of financial irregularities. Mr Chubais, who has steered Russia's privatisation campaign, denied the charges.
Mr Yeltsin sacked Mr Chubais as his main economic adviser early last year but brought him into the Kremlin last July as presidential chief-of-staff. The economist is one of a handful of officials who met Mr Yeltsin when he was preparing for heart surgery in the second half of last year.
Yeltsin aides expect the president to be fit for a CIS summit and to hold talks with President Chirac when he visits Moscow the next two weeks.